Going Cuckoo Hiding Obama's “Gatsby”

“And I hope she'll be a fool—that's the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool.” – Daisy Buchanan, love interest from F. Scott Fitzgerald's literary classicThe Great Gatsby (1925)

By publishing “Our dishonest president,” “Why Trump lies,” and “Trump's Authoritarian Vision,” the Editorial Board of the Los Angeles Times tries to play their readers for fools. To that end, this series should have been printed on April Fool's Day. After all, they comprise an absurdist anti-Trump hatchet job that actually epitomizes Barack Obama. Some 70 days in (within any new president's honeymoon), did any detractor treat the former president with partisan venom or unjustifiable disdain?

That answer is absolutely not. Back then, everything for the inexperienced sophomoric senator from Illinois was hope and change rainbows and unicorns. After 8 years, his progressive fantasy—a dystopian design to turn America into a big government, European-style socialist state—resulted in nothing good. Contrast that to Trump's rejuvenating vision of “America First”. Hence, it's laughable to claim, “He sees himself as not merely a force for change, but as a wrecking ball.” By definition, that which destroys can't also be that which restores. Utter hogwash! What of Obama's record-shattering debt (9.3 trillion added), ObamaCare's imploding failure (BHO's “Keep your plan” whopper: Politifact's Lie of the Year in 2013), Middle East tumult, and the likelihood of a nuclear Iran (funded by Obama's 1.7 billion dollar payout in January of 2016), to name just a few of the last administration's messes. That unmistakable damage has nothing to do with President Trump. Per the facts, exactly who's been a wrecking ball here? The politically schizophrenic press can't find anything good about Mr. Trump—or anything wrong with Mr. Obama. Should such naked bias and baseless propaganda be trusted?

Under Obama for most of a decade, they found nothing amiss, as the world burned with perpetual Middle Eastern strife and terrorist insurgency. Simultaneously, America teetered on economic insolvency, enflamed by a domestic racial powder keg. Meanwhile, the enigma “in charge” was a F. Scott Fitzgerald style dilettante who led from behind and governed via golfing greens. (Per CBS reporter Mark Knoller, Barack Obama played 333 times over his two terms.) Interestingly, both high living figures changed their names: James Gatz assumed the Jay Gatsby persona, while Barry Soetoro became Barack Obama. Yet, the parallels run deeper to equally murky pasts. After all, doesn't Gatsby's bootlegging and shadowy mob associations eerily denote Obama's Indonesian childhood, his controversial birthplace (read: Kenya or Hawaii?) and unclear religious persuasion (read: Christian or Muslim faith?). Furthermore, both men abandoned humble roots for larger-than-life ego-building aims. In pretender Gatsby case, to achieve wealth in order to be worthy of his “golden girl”. Similarly, for Obama, to gain the ultimate standing by playing at being a U.S. president.

Moreover, the two share a common psychology: the same heedless mind-set of the unyielding dreamer. The difference being Gatsby's obsession with the past (“Can't repeat the past?” he cried incredulously. “Why of course you can.”) versus Obama's sole interest in dominating the future:

“Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we've been waiting for. We are the change that we seek.” – Candidate Obama on Super Tuesday, February 5, 2008

As president, he clearly enjoyed the office's pomp and circumstance while, like Gatsby, completely ignoring distasteful realities. Specifically, what of his forgotten political hometown of Chicago: the nation's murder capitol for 5 of the 8 years of his presidency? Beyond that, Obama told numerous bald-faced lies and constantly stoked racial tensions to distract from his litany of atrocious mistakes. Even worse, he never took any responsibility whatsoever. Abetted by the MSM—today same as yesteryear—the political opposition is blamed for all of his failures. Thus, isn't Barack Obama the moneyed archetype for a nefarious Gatsby playboy? And speaking of careless people, doesn't designer duds Michelle roughly approximate superficial, shirt-obsessed Daisy Buchanan?

“[Barack Obama] was a narcissist and a demagogue who used fear and dishonesty to appeal to the worst in American voters. The Times called him unprepared and unsuited for the job he was seeking, and said his election would be a 'catastrophe'.”

By any objective measure, the Obama years were exactly that: the worst of any modern U.S. president.

For the record, Donald Trump opposes the dysfunctional and dictatorial Washington “swamp” that Mr. Obama exploited. While the LA Times freely vilifies The Donald as “authoritarian,” they completely disregard the guy who actually was. Of the two, which ultra-constitutional president ruled by fiat with executive orders? Which one bragged about using a pen and a phone as a middle finger to Congress, our system's lawmaking body? It's frankly Orwellian for them to conflate Obama's totalitarianism with Trump's anti-establishment stance that liberty-loving Americans cheer!

Like Obama, these anonymous scribblers have a tenuous relationship with reality. See how desperate they are to rehabilitate his failed legacy - to change the subject by unfairly besmirching his replacement. How is their extended Trump hit piece not an adverse reaction to his ongoing dismantling of the last guy's ruinous policies? How else does one logically explain this newspaper's unhinged four-piece tirade that wrongly transposes Obama's misdeeds and track record with Trump's? The LA Times's premature condemnation proves their birdbrained publication had indeed flown the coop! Ideologues' blind devotion to a facade: same as Gatsby's deluded love for Daisy, another unworthy idol.

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About the AuthorDavid Hunter

David is an Associate Editor of "Capitol Hill Outsider." He is a widely published DC-based writer of political commentary. He has a Master's in Professional Writing from USC.

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